FATHERLAND
Part 2
The French writer and philosopher Albert Camus structured his autobiographical novel “The First Man” into two chapters. In Part 1, the protagonist gives a fascinating account of his childhood in the slums of Algiers, describing how, alongside the archaic beauty of simplicity, he discovered education, and how he – having grown up as a child in a family of illiterates – is ultimately awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.
In the second chapter, the first-person narrator returns to his hometown, Algiers, to his mother, who has now grown old and is almost deaf and dumb, and who still lives with her brother, his uncle Etienne, in the humble flat of his now-deceased grandmother. And he encounters a world that is changing at a breakneck pace. The French colony of Algeria is striving for independence. Camus champions the rights of the Berbers and Arabs whilst at the same time worrying about the lives of his own family. He realises how his homeland is slipping away from him amidst the insurgents’ struggle, and he sets out in search of his father, who was killed in the First World War and whom he never knew. He begins to wonder how it came to be that people like his ancestors ended up in this region, which was foreign to them at the time. And how ‘home’ is to be understood in a modern sense – when it is not only the home of the indigenous people, but also that of those who have come to the country through numerous waves of migration and periods of colonisation.
A moving play of compelling topicality.
Cast
Narration: Ulrich Noethen
Accordion: Valentin Butt
Oud: Samir Mansour
Percussion: Claudio Spieler / Max Gerwien
Violin: Lucia Priester
Bass: Christoph Dangelmaier
Lighting design: Birte Horst
Composition: Christoph Dangelmaier
Script adaptation, production, direction: Martin Mühleis
Production manager: Vera Löffler
Dates
- Tuesday, 10. November 2026 – 08:00 PM
